Order Now with Main Event on Kayo Sports<\/a>.<\/p>\nMelbourne was leading 12-6 midway through the first half at Accor Stadium when Walsh led with his shoulder attempting to tackle Coates, making direct contact with the Storm winger\u2019s face.<\/p>\n
Coates was falling forward at the time, but his head snapped back after the contact and the manner of the collision caused NRL great Andrew Johns to immediately state: \u201cWe\u2019ve seen all year this is a sin bin.\u201d<\/p>\n
Walsh avoided the bin, however, getting placed on report but facing no further action.<\/p>\n
Melbourne scored again through Will Warbrick minutes later before Clive Churchill medallist Walsh produced one of the moments of the match, scything his way through a slew of Storm defenders to cross under the posts and reduce the margin to four points.<\/p>\n
Frustratingly for Storm players and supporters, Walsh\u2019s try came almost exactly 10 minutes after his high shot on Coates.<\/p>\n
So it\u2019s easy to draw the conclusion that had Walsh been sent to the bin, not only would he have been unable to score that crucial try, Melbourne would have had an extended period to capitalise on the extra man advantage.<\/p>\n
Like Johns, Grant was questioning the consistency of the refereeing after Walsh managed to stay on the park.<\/p>\n
The Melbourne captain also had a recent, personal incident to reflect upon after the game.<\/p>\n
Five minutes into the second half of the Storm\u2019s round 25 victory over Canterbury back in August, Grant caught Harry Hayes with his shoulder as the Bulldog brought the ball back from a kick-off.<\/p>\n
On that occasion, Grant was placed on report and sent to the bin, ultimately earning a two-match suspension from the NRL judiciary.<\/p>\n
Grant brought that incident up when speaking to Channel 9 after the game on Sunday and seemed to be pointing the finger at the Bunker, which was led by Ashley Klein, rather than on-field referee Grant Atkins.<\/p>\n
\u201cI got sin-binned a couple of weeks ago and got two weeks for bugger all and then we come out and do that,\u201d Grant told 9 News of the Walsh tackle.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn saying that, that\u2019s probably not Grant\u2019s call, that\u2019s probably coming from above Grant.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou know, we can give him a break on that, but we can probably ask some questions a little bit deeper.\u201d<\/p>\n
Walsh has since been hit with a grade one careless high tackle charge, copping a $3,000 fine and avoiding suspension.<\/p>\n
Adding just a little more salt to the Storm\u2019s wounds, lock Trent Loiero was sent to the bin in the dying minutes of the game and hit with a two-match ban for his late high shot on Brisbane\u2019s Brendan Piakura.<\/p>\n
The high shots were a huge talking point among the footy world after the game.<\/p>\n
The Fox League account on X tweeted: \u201cThe NRL needs to do something about the shambolic inconsistencies with sin bins.<\/p>\n
\u201cReece Walsh escaped a sin bin for a shoulder to the head of Xavier Coates, while Trent Loiero got sin-binned and suspended for a high shot in the same game.\u201d<\/p>\n
NRL reporter Lachlan Jeffery wrote: \u201cIf this was a club game, Reece Walsh would be in the sin bin for sure.\u201d<\/p>\n
X account Jacko Mallett quipped: \u201cImpressive effort by Reece Walsh to score from the sin bin. Oh hang on.\u201d<\/p>\n
Simon Shirley added: \u201cNo sin bin!? Oh hang on, Reece Walsh tax!\u201d<\/p>\n
The lack of consistency was the biggest issue among NRL fans.<\/p>\n
Storm five-eighth Cam Munster wasn\u2019t making excuses, however, telling Nine after the game: \u201cThere\u2019s a sour taste in our mouth. We\u2019ll be hungry next year.\u201d<\/p>\n
Originally published as Storm skipper Harry Grant claps back over Reece Walsh act<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Storm skipper Harry Grant has suggested double standards were at play after Brisbane superstar Reece Walsh escaped the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":193638,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[568],"tags":[2620,48257,64,63,64925,4428,30195,29968,122223,122225,35895,659,763,2105,11288,120789,83670,122232,122231,34159,122228,122233,4466,761,762,122230,158,62283,13391,122224,8088,45629,85,122226,122229,53979,122227,7663,38445,799,4548],"class_list":["post-193637","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nrl","tag-agence-france-presse","tag-andrew-johns","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-ball-back","tag-brisbane-broncos","tag-cameron-spencer","tag-ciryl-gane","tag-club-game","tag-daughter-raises-eyebrows","tag-double-standards","tag-footy-world","tag-fox-league","tag-getty-images-inc","tag-grand-final","tag-grand-final-news","tag-grant-atkins","tag-izhar-khan","tag-jacko-mallett","tag-james-dampney","tag-lachlan-jeffery","tag-man-advantage","tag-melbourne-storm","tag-national-rugby-league","tag-nationalrugbyleague","tag-news-of-the-walsh","tag-nrl","tag-premiership-triumph","tag-reece-walsh","tag-simon-shirley","tag-sin-bin","tag-sin-bins","tag-sports","tag-storm-captain","tag-storm-five-eighth","tag-storm-skipper","tag-tackle-charge","tag-talking-points","tag-title-defence","tag-tom-aspinall","tag-trent-loiero"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/193637","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=193637"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/193637\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/193638"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=193637"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=193637"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=193637"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}